Brynjolfsson Says Self-Driving Cars Developing Faster Than Expected

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MIT professor and IT expert Erik Brynjolfsson says that self-driving car technology has developed faster than he expected.

“It caught me off guard how quickly this technology caught on,” Dr. Brynjolfsson said Thursday during a panel discussion at Council on Foreign Relations headquarters in New York, where he and two other experts—Intel Corp. scientist Jennifer Healey and consultant Chunka Mui—engaged in an often spirited debate about how the technology will evolve.

Not so long ago, Dr. Brynjolfsson said that self-driving cars were beyond the capability of computer science.

“About 10 years ago, I was teaching a class at MIT. One of the topics of discussion was what machines can do and what machines can’t do. One of my examples of things that machines can’t do was drive a car,” he recalled. His reasoning, he said, was that computers were good at structured tasks, but that driving involved too much unstructured information, such as visual data and the rules of the road, for computers to adequately handle. A 2004 book, The New Division of Labor, by Frank Levy and Richard J. Murnane, explored some of those themes, too.

In 2012, however, Dr. Brynjolfsson found himself in a fully automated Google test car, making the trip from Google’s campus to San Francisco and back. “It was humbling,” he recalled. “When I got to ride in a driverless car, I was surprised at how effective it was.”

At some point during the trip along Route 101, a vehicle in front of the Google test car came to a full and unexpected stop, “It was a full stop right in the middle of the highway. I hoped that the Google car noticed. Fortunately, it did,” Dr. Brynjolfsson said.

During the ride, he said, he experienced three stages of reaction, including a few minutes of fear, five or 10 minutes of exuberance, and a long period of boredom. “It was a bit like watching a dishwasher. It drives very carefully, and of course it obeys the rules. I think it is a microcosm of how society will react to it.”

“I think you all agree this will happen,” a member of the audience said.

“We disagree on what this is,” Dr. Brynjolfsson replied. “I think we agree something big will happen. We just don’t agree on what will happen.”

“This is our primary disagreement, the timeline,” Dr. Healey said. “I don’t think policy changes that rapidly. I think it is going to be slow adoption. I think it is going to be gradual adoption.” Some of those policy issues include new ideas about safety and liability, as well as the government’s encouragement of connected car technology, which links vehicles with mobile communication technology and allows them to exchange information with one another and with transportation infrastructure. Dr. Healey said she thinks vehicle to vehicle technology “could be very important.”

She said that the IT in cars “is fabulous technology, but it can’t see ahead forever. But information from forever ahead can be sent back to the car or cars, through the cloud, or they can talk to one another.”

Mr. Mui, head of the Devil’s Advocate Group, suggested that the policy debate would catch up with the technology, instead of the other way around. He said a long debate over vehicle to vehicle communications, followed by an even longer deployment, would slow down the introduction of self-driving cars, a technology that he said had the potential to save thousands of lives a year by reducing traffic accidents.

Mr. Mui said that if deployment of self-driving vehicles is dependent upon vehicle to vehicle communications, “you will never see it happen.”

Correction–This article has been updated to state that a 2004 book, The New Division of Labor, was written by Frank Levy and Richard J. Murnane. It was not written by Erik Brynjolfsson, as an earlier version stated.

Comments (5 of 8)

Brynjolfsson was NOT wrong or incorrect about his comment that self-driving cars are "beyond the capability of computer science." In fact, he was right on. The question is NOT (only) "when". Self-driving cars drive REALLY slowly (unusably slow) and they cannot handle even the most simple of 'complex' driving situations. They DO NOT (and will not for some time, as in MANY years, if not decades) be able to drive in the rain, snow (ing), or (especially) fog, or in any "true" "complex" driving situations. AT BEST they are an interesting parlor trick at this point, and will be so for many years to come. In fact, most of the people reading this will be long-dead before they become any true form of usable reality. (we have a MUCH higher chance of destroying civilization before self-driving cars, "flying cars", and/or jet packs become a reality, or having a manned space station on the Moon, much less Mars, etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum, ad nauseum)

10:07 pm November 26, 2014

Smartopinion wrote:

Since Google's current revenue is matching customers to manufacturers it's next revenue model will be in logistics. Manufacturers will use same day delivery service from Google with its driver less vehicles and that's the main reason why Google is interested in this type of technology... Driver less vehicles would impact the supply chain business models which would be additional revenue channels for Google and other advertising companies..

8:45 pm March 21, 2014

Antonio Alvarado wrote:

The driverless car is an amazing concept but maybe adding coexisting technologies such as the BiModal Glideway would broaden the horizon for the driverless market! The BiModal Glideway doesnt only work for personal but commercial and public transportation, take a look at our video on Youtube or facebook.com/BiModalGlideway we can also be followed on twitter @bimodalglideway we would love to get some feed back on our project so tell us what you think!

9:39 am March 17, 2014

Conrad Dunkerson wrote:

James Bullis, you don't see an economic gain? Wouldn't taxi rides cost significantly less if there was no human driver to pay? Wouldn't goods transported by trucks similarly cost less with no truck drivers to pay? Wouldn't lower 'car rental' costs lead more consumers to give up having a car at all? Wouldn't the ability of a car to drive itself (empty) to various family members at need allow many families to have fewer cars? Wouldn't decreased accidents impact car insurance rates and vehicle repair/replacement costs? Et cetera.

Yes, Google's current control systems are expensive. On the other hand, some car companies have demonstrated viable self-driving capabilities using nothing but a few simple cameras. Safety will likely require something in between, but the idea that the cost of the control systems will prevent adoption of self driving cars is just not reasonable. Even if we assumed that Google stayed with its current controls (which are designed to gather data as much as to actually drive the car) AND that these didn't come down significantly in price as they were mass manufactured, the economic benefits would still VASTLY outweigh the costs. It isn't even close.

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